


Galaxies Between Us

by fitslikeakey



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: All aboard the Feels train, Angst, F/M, KaraMel, Mostly Canon Compliant, Romance, just a lot of angst, some AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2018-02-06
Packaged: 2019-02-06 23:53:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12828819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fitslikeakey/pseuds/fitslikeakey
Summary: Various Karamel One-ShotsChapter 3: Post 3x13."By some mystery of the universe, I end up back here again. Suddenly those ghosts I’ve been pretending not to have on my shoulders for most of a decade are walking and talking in front of me, and everyone else that matters to me won’t be born for centuries. And somehow I'm just supposed to deal with it."Kara finds Mon-El alone at the bar. She may be the worst person to attempt to make him feel better, and it's for that reason she may be the only who can.





	1. The Distance Between Us

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 1- Post 3x07, Mon-El and Kara confess some truths during a heartfelt moment.

The air was crisp that night, and as he stepped outside the DEO he took off at a human's jog to warm himself up in his thin clothing. He had to get away, couldn't think from all the faces staring at him, expecting a person he didn't know how to be, a man he hadn't known in the better part of a decade.   
  
He hadn't forgotten her, as if such a thing were possible. When he'd looked down the barrel of the gun and seen her face, it had been exactly as he had always remembered it, soft, exquisite beauty, gentle curls defying gravity and wind as if she were an enchantress, not a superhero. Her eyes were just as delicate as he'd pictured them, always betraying her every emotion, every thought. He'd seen the instant she recognized him, his heart dropping the instant a look of hope had fixed itself upon her face.   
  
He ran faster. The buildings and greenery surrounding him was achingly familiar, and it seemed almost like a dream to be back after so many years away. The world he had known as a younger man had been gifted back to him, the world that had taught him the value of kindness, of honor. He remembered the innocence of his time in this century so clearly; he'd treasured it deeply in the form of the chain around his neck.   
  
Not for the first time, he wished to himself that he remembered how to be that man.  
  
He had seen the expression of hurt on Imra's face as he excused himself from the DEO, but standing in between the only two women he'd ever loved, he felt the air sucked out of him like he'd never been cured of his lead allergy, like his mother had thrown him back in prison. He'd needed desperately to get away.   
  
He was moving quickly now, and he vaguely recognized that he need to slow his pace, that he was approaching the speed of Olympic runners and could soon attract too much attention. He slowed down as he entered a park near the bay of National City, turning to run alongside the edge of the water, reflecting the lights of the city through the darkness.  
  
He'd traveled merely a few hundred feet along the bay when he saw Supergirl standing alone near the edge of the boardwalk, her head bent over as if in prayer.   
  
"Kara," he said hoarsely, the words slipping out before he could stop them. She was facing the water, her leather-covered arms hanging over the railing, and she jumped slightly at his voice, but didn’t turn to face him.  
  
"Please go away," she said, her voice breaking. He hadn't seen her since he'd revealed the truth about his relationship with Imra, but even the side of her face revealed that the look of anguish had not left her.  
  
He swallowed deeply. "Kara, I'm so sorry..."  
  
"I said please go away," she said, and her head snapped toward him. There were tear tracks going down her face, and his heart stopped. He stared at her, and for a moment, there was silence, the sound of flowing water its only companion.   
  
"I was flying just a minute ago," she said eventually. "I wanted to clear my head. I used to do it all the time to relax." She turned away from him and he joined her at the railing. "I used to listen to your heartbeat when I was flying, Mon-El. Six million people in this city and I could pick yours out in a millisecond, whether you were with me or all the way across town. After you left I couldn't do it. Couldn't clear my head because I knew something was missing, my personal drum beat keeping me safe in the night. And tonight," her voice caught on the word, "I couldn’t figure out why I was flying faster than I have in months, why the air felt so clear, but it was because your heart was beating right alongside everyone else's, right as if I never sent you off into space and threw your heart and your trust with it."   
  
She flipped her head down so he couldn’t see her face, but his superhuman hearing caught the faint hint of tears hitting the boardwalk. "Kara,” he said desperately, “it wasn't your fault. You had to do it to protect Earth. You're still protecting Earth." His attempts to console her were pointless and he knew it, but what was left of the man he had once been urged him to keep trying. He sighed, lifting a hand to run through the hair on the top of his head. "For whatever it's worth, I was a mess for two years after I left." She looked up at him suddenly, eyes rimmed with hopelessness and just a hint of confusion. "My friends in the pod... They sort of adopted me when I crash landed on Earth in the future. In the future, there are more people like us, more powerful refugee aliens taking shelter on Earth as more of the universe gets discovered. We all helped each other become stronger. I never wanted to do anything when I got there, or make any friends. It lasted for a really long time, Kara. There were so many times when I wished I had just died." He took a deep breath. "Finally, enough time passed that getting out of bed in the morning didn't seem so impossible. I let them in and they became my family."   
  
"And Imra?" Kara asked softly.   
  
"She lost her first love, too. I guess in wallowing in our misery we ended up finding each other." He carefully put a hand over hers on the railing, noting where the metal had bent from her strong grip. "Kara, I didn't go out looking to hurt you. If I had ever thought in a million years I might see you again, I never would have..."  
  
"I know," she whispered. She was silent again, stepping back and forth in a nervous pattern and looking between the bay and his face. "You-you're different."  
  
He nodded slowly, taking his own pause to glance out at the ocean. "There are things you don't know about the future, it's...it's not what you would expect," he said, choosing his words carefully. "I've seen things I never thought I could see, I've had to do things I never would have thought I could do, to protect others, to take care of the people I..."  
  
"Love," she finished gently. She gave him a soft smile.  
  
He swallowed nervously, looking her directly in the eyes. "Kara, the man you were or are in love with, I don't even know him anymore."  
  
She pursed her lip as if at a loss for words. "I do," she said after a moment. She slipped her hand out from under his, turning her body to face his completely and grabbing his arm. 

He stared down at her, and he could hear her heartbeat quicken as she looked back up at him. She took a tentative step toward him as if in a haze, and she was suddenly so close that he could feel her breath against him. She _was_ still in love with him, he realized with a start. The knowledge hit him so suddenly it felt like a punch to the gut. For one painful second, the years faded away and he was a young man again, fresh off his home planet and thrust into a world of heroism at the side of the most powerful and beautiful woman he’d ever known.

Before he knew what he was doing, he’d leaned forward and met her forehead with his own, and time might as well have stopped. For a few heartbeats, the world was still.

 _Imra_ , a voice inside his chest murmured finally, a gentle reminder. He backed away from Kara, and she opened her eyes, snapping out of a trance. They were quiet again. "I think my team and I are stuck here, for the time being,” he offered up ultimately, shifting them back into safer territory.  
  
She nodded, the mask of Supergirl slowly coming back over her face even as he could see the leftover redness in her eyes. "I'll make sure everyone who passes the DEO security checks gets a social security number and ID, as well as anything else they might need while they are here. You might be stuck sleeping there for a few days, though."  
  
"I'm sure they will all be grateful for the hospitality," he answered diplomatically, offering her a half-hearted smile.   
  
"Mon-El," she said, the superhero mask lowering once more and hesitation emerging. "I-I don't know if I can be your friend. Not now."  
  
He nodded slowly, walking a few paces away from her and bracing himself on the railing. "Kara, I..."   
  
"Don't," she answered quickly, mirroring his actions two feet away. She was intentionally looking away from him. "Anything you say will just force me to love you more and that will make it hurt even more than it already does."   
  
He frowned, looking at her just as intently as he had before despite the increased distance. He didn't know how to respond, so he didn’t.  
  
They stayed there for a while, standing a few paces apart on the edge of the water. Every couple minutes, one of them would turn towards the other, as if to start a new conversation, but the words died in their throats at the sight of the other. There was a distance between them now, one Mon El wasn't sure could be bridged, and yet he was frozen to the spot, suddenly unable to contemplate running away again.   
  
_Rao, what could I possibly do to fix this?_


	2. The Fight Between Us

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Weeks after Mon-El's return, he and Kara can't seem to stay away from each other. Alex learns some things she wishes she could forget about it.

“You can hide in here forever, but eventually Voldemort is going to come for you.”

Mon-El’s head snapped up from _Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix_ as Kara appeared suddenly in his hideout spot at the DEO. The dark room was filled with emergency supplies in case of a sudden lockdown, and in his time there when he’d first come to Earth from Daxam, he’d discovered a soft armchair there that made it a perfect escape when the pressures of being a hero got to be a little too much.

“I have to hide if I’m ever going to have a chance to finish this series. Do you know how long I’ve been waiting? How will I know if Ron and Hermione are ever going to admit how they feel about each other?” Kara chuckled. “How did you find me here, anyway?” He asked, moderately embarrassed.

She raised an eyebrow at him, stepping fully into the room and shutting the door behind her. The room grew dim once the door was closed, a small reading lamp next to the armchair providing the only light on Mon-El’s face. He looked exhausted. Kara and the DEO had been chasing after Reign for weeks, and Mon-El had insisted on being a part of every battle, Imra often close by. Frequently she’d arrive at the building in the morning to find him asleep on top of Winn’s keyboard, or curled up on a mat in the training room.

“You can’t honestly think that I didn’t know you were here all this time,” Kara said, a small smile on her face. “I found you asleep in here after our first training together, when I made you keep going for a couple hours and finally you swore to me up and down that you were going to the bathroom…”

“In my defense it was seven hours, Kara, seven. I’d barely been on Earth a month and you were training me like a Marine,” Mon-El interrupted with the barest hint of a smirk. “Also, you were terrifying back then.”

“Oh and I’m not now?” She teased, grinning, and she shot him a dangerous look. All at once she had moved to yank him out of his chair, but he was two steps ahead of her, and in a millionth of a second he’d gotten up and flipped them around so she was pressed up against the gray wall behind his chair, so fast that even Kara Danvers found herself rendered out of breath. He was still smirking at her, and he wasn’t even touching her anywhere but on her shoulders, but the dark gaze he gave her lit her on fire all the same. “When did you learn to do that?” She asked in a breathy voice, staring straight back at him.

He merely scoffed, letting her go and backing away a few paces to a cabinet on the other side of the closet. “Always going to see me as the hero-in-training, aren’t you?”

She took another step towards him, and in a very un-Kara Danvers-like voice, whispered, “Are you prepared to claim that you’re no longer in training?”

He raised an eyebrow at her, playing along. “I think I’ve picked up a few tricks.” They were frozen for a moment, standing just a few inches apart and with eyes locked on one another. Kara was bold enough to reach out a hand, running one finger down the hairs on his face in a way that made him tremble. It was a challenge, and they both knew it. She gave him an innocent smile, and he narrowed his eyes at her, daring her to go on. He watched her hand as ever so slowly, she moved it to his chest and poked him firmly in the center.

“Sure you want to do that?” He asked in a low, gravelly voice.

She poked him again.

Mon-El smiled. “If you’re sure.”

Almost instantly, they had both sped to the training room fifty yards away. They began combat, Kara swinging an arm towards Mon-El’s stomach that he leaped away from. Their movements grew faster and faster, and after half a minute their fight had become a blur for everyone else at the DEO.

“Good lord,” Alex muttered, rising from her desk and moving to the door of the room. Kara and Mon-El were indistinguishable from the swirl of wind around them, though Alex could make out her sister’s curls spinning around every time she did a flip upside down. At one second, the blur stopped as Mon-El had her pinned to an unlucky practice dummy; a few seconds later, Kara was over him on the ground, his hands locked down by hers over his head.

“That’s incredible,” a voice said next to her. Alex turned to see a short dark haired woman staring at the pair with an unreadable expression on her face. Imra looked up at Alex. “I’ve read about how strong Supergirl is, but seeing her matched up against Mon-El is something else entirely. Where we come from, no one can match Mon-El in hand-to-hand combat.” They both held their breath as Kara flew both of them to the ceiling, allowing Mon-El to hold her body firmly above his before dropping both of their weight to the ground. The concrete ground immediately cracked, and Alex groaned. “Mon-El kept telling us that Supergirl could kick his ass, but we never believed him, he trained harder than anybody.”

“She could,” Alex responded, clearing her throat before adding, “I mean she can kick his ass. When Mon-El used to live here, she could wipe the floor with him and then make him clean it up….but I have to admit, this is impressive.”

Imra nodded, eyes still wide at the scene. “I can see why they got along so well,” she commented softly.

Alex turned to Imra then, surprised. “Mon-El talked about her?”

Imra sighed, shifting her weight from one foot to another. “Not at first. We have a similar base of operations to this one back in our century. Not to reveal too much about the future, but for the last several years we have needed more powerful people. People capable of protecting Earth, or at least what’s left of it. We found Mon-El a year after he got to our century. He’d enrolled in some police academy because he couldn’t figure out how else to help and he kept breaking the Earthly laws of physics in all of his fitness tests. We came in to check him out, and figured out that he’d been dropping off criminals at the police station at night.

“He agreed to work with us pretty quickly, but it was months before he trusted any of us enough to tell us where he had come from. After about a year and a half, he finally started telling us about working with Supergirl. I know she’s your sister, but to us, she’s like King Arthur, she’s a legend. We could tell from the way that Mon-El spoke about her that everything we’d heard was true. He barely mentioned how they felt about each other, but the way he talked, we all knew.”

Their conversation was halted when Kara and Mon-El ended up blasted onto opposite walls of the training facility and stopped sparring. The concrete in the room was cracked in at least four parts of the room, and there were half a dozen practice dummies scattered around that had lost limbs from being thrown around. Alex couldn’t help but smile as she saw the pair laughing at the mess they had created, seemingly having forgotten about the tension of the past month.

“I just don’t understand,” Alex admitted. “I know time heals all wounds and he was away from her for much longer, but when they were together last year, they would have done anything for each other. How did he end up married to someone else?”

She waited for Imra to look insulted, but the face didn’t come. “I think they would still do anything for each other,” Imra answered, wistfully staring at her husband. “Look at them, it’s like the world exists only in that room.”

It was, Alex acknowledged. Her sister had a smile stretched across her face that she hadn’t seen in months, and she and Mon-El were making jokes about how much he knew about the ending of some of their favorite tv shows while picking up some of the mess they made. Mon-El reached around Kara's side to knock her off her feet a little, and the battle began again.

“Doesn’t this bother you?”

Imra exhaled, looking away from the scene. “It’s more complicated than that.”

“I don’t mean to insult your intelligence or anything, but how?”

Imra started pacing across the doorway, awkwardly clasping her hands together as if she was anxious. “Alex, would you care to go for a walk….away from superpowered ears, perhaps?”

Alex gave her a confused look before nodding slowly.

Twenty minutes later, the two were at a park five miles away, surrounded by trees and the hustle of young families kicking balls around and older couples sitting on park benches. “Is this far enough that Kara can’t hear us?” Imra asked.

“She could hear us if she was concentrating, but this is far enough that there’s very little chance that she will be.”

 They started down a walking trail at the edge of the park. The sun was starting to set to their left, and the air had cooled considerably since Alex had arrived at the DEO a few hours earlier. “So what is this about?”

Imra gave her a nervous glance before proceeding. “There are plans that our team made for coming back here that have not exactly gone the way we meant for them to go. We did mean to come to this century, but we were trying to time our arrival for a particular moment that may still be a ways off. That’s why part of our team is still asleep in our ship at the bottom of the ocean; Mon-El and I weren’t sure if we should wake them before the time comes.” She paused, looking over at a couple with a stroller that was sitting on a bench a few feet away. “When we first realized we needed to go back to this century, no one thought it was a good idea for Mon-El to come with us. We thought we could sneak around for a few days or weeks undetected, but if anyone here caught a whiff that he was home, it could seriously derail our efforts to keep Earth safe. As you can see, neither of those plans have worked out the way we thought they would.”

She continued. “Mon-El absolutely refused to stay back. He said if anyone was going to Supergirl’s world to keep her safe, he was going to be there too. We tried to reason with him. We begged, at one point. Rokk, our de facto leader, threatened him on more than one occasion. Nothing worked, we just made him more determined. So we made a deal.” They turned a corner, walking along a small bridge over a narrow stream. “How much do you know about my powers?”

“I don’t think I know anything,” Alex replied, growing more and more bewildered by the second.

“I’m an empath. I can control a person’s mind and memories.” Alex’s eyebrows jumped up, but she waited for Imra to go on. “While Mon-El and Rokk were arguing about him coming for the twentieth time, I came up with an idea. Mon-El could come, but he had to be altered in such a way that he would think he had to stay away from Kara. He had to think that it was wrong for him to be anywhere near her.”

Alex’s eyes were wide. “He had to think he was married to someone else.”

Imra swallowed, then repeated her words. “He had to think he was married to someone else.”

It was at that moment back at the DEO that Kara and Mon-El retreated back to the main office. “I’ll be feeling that one for a few days,” Mon-El said, stretching his arms over his head and plopping down at Winn’s empty desk. “I haven’t scrapped like that in months. My team tends to have far more brainy superpowers.”

Kara’s mouth dropped, and she pretended to be offended. “Are you implying that I am all muscle?”

Mon-El tilted his head and grinned at her, propping his feet up onto another office chair and stretching down to his toes. “I’m just saying, nobody has ever beaten you just by wrestling you. Until today, of course.”

“Oh I was going easy on you,” Kara teased. “I could have taken you in five seconds flat.”

Mon-El laughed. “Are you sure? Because I don’t think I’ve ever heard you panting before…in a fight that is.” They both froze at his accidental innuendo. “Crap, I didn’t mean..”

“It’s okay,” she said quietly. “I just have to get used to reality.” She stared at the ground.

Mon-El bit his lip, a knot tightening in his stomach. Five miles away, Imra shut her eyes in fear as she felt their identical, simultaneous thoughts.

_I wish I knew how not to love you._

Imra stopped walking, turning to look at Alex directly in the middle of the park. “The point of me bringing you out here is, our plan is not working. Mon-El’s memories were altered so that he thinks with time, he moved on, and though our marriage is political, he’s mostly happy. He’s not in love with me, by any means, but we have a friendly enough partnership. But as soon as we ran into Kara, I knew the plan was going to fail completely. He’s just fallen in love with her again.” She shook her head in defeat. “Alex, I know you’re angry, but we were trying to protect Kara.”

“So you’re just saying I should be okay with someone who was a stranger to me a month ago keeping my sister from the only man she’s ever loved?” Alex replied angrily.

“Yes,” Imra responded firmly, reaching out to put a hand on Alex’s shoulder. She paused. “Because if Kara and Mon-El can’t stay away from each other, and they clearly can’t, one of them is going to die.”


	3. Islands Between Us

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 3: Post 3x13.  
> "By some mystery of the universe, I end up back here again. Suddenly those ghosts I’ve been pretending not to have on my shoulders for most of a decade are walking and talking in front of me, and everyone else that matters to me won’t be born for centuries. And somehow, I'm just supposed to deal with it."
> 
> Kara finds Mon-El alone at the bar. She may be the worst person to attempt to make him feel better, and it's for that reason she may be the only who can.

 

It’s half past three in the morning when Kara enters the bar. It’s a Wednesday night and mostly deserted, though a group of five purple aliens are playing ping pong in the corner and there’s a Orandonian couple arguing with each other in one of the booths. Another alien posing as what looks to be a teacher sips some kind of clear drink while examining the selections on the jukebox. She’s never been to the bar this late before on a weeknight, wouldn’t have tonight either if the echoes of Julia’s pleas weren’t bouncing around her brain. She nearly hit a building twice on the flight over to the bar. She’s just about to turn around and leave the bar when she notices a fur-lined jean jacket up at the bar.

Mon-El sits alone at one end of the bar, his eyes fixed on the almost-empty cocktail glass in front of him, tilting it back and forward with one finger. The bartender is giving him a strange look, as if he knows that this man was working behind the bar less than a year ago and has suddenly aged to appear thirty. Mon-El is tense, as if he feels the eyes on him, but refuses to give any other sign of acknowledgment. “Mon-El?” Kara says softly as she approaches the bar. She places a hand on his shoulder. He doesn’t move.

She reaches to take the glass away from him, but he grips it tightly with his left hand. He starts smacking his tongue to the roof of his mouth in a soft rhythm, moving his lips back and forth and open and closed. “If you add it all up,” he starts speaking, slowly, carefully. “If you add up the days- the days with the legion and the days since I’ve been back here- it’s one thousand, three hundred and twenty-nine days. Pretty close to four years. One thousand, three hundred, twenty-nine days since I last had a sip of alcohol, alien or otherwise.”

“Mon-El,” Kara says again, frowning. She’s nervous and her feet move back and forth so she’s bouncing slightly. “What happened?”

He ignores her, finally letting go of the glass. Kara immediately whips it away from him and sends it flying into the sink on the other side of the bar. He won’t look at her, instead pushing himself away from the bar with both hands and leaning further over towards his lap. Kara doesn’t need superpowers to hear the splintering wood of the bar beneath his grip. “You don’t have to do this,” he says in a low voice. “You shouldn’t have to fix me. You never deserved to have to fix me.”

“What are you talking about?” She asks, worried. She reaches automatically to scratch the back of his head like she always did when they were on the couch together before, but she snatches her hand back at the thought.

 _Before_.

“You don’t need to be fixed,” she says in what she hopes is a soothing voice, choosing instead to pat his forearm in what she hopes is a reassuring manner. She decides to avoid the subject. “How long have you been here?”

“I don’t know. The sun was still out. The Orandonian couple were still acting like they liked each other.” It’s February in National City, and the sun sets just before six. He’s been at the bar for hours, alone.

She reaches over to pat him on the shoulder again, and he cringes away from her touch before she can get closer than a few inches. She tries to ignore the sting in her chest. “Do you want me to call Imra?”

“No!” He snaps, his eyes finally flickering up to meet hers and they stare at one another. She doesn’t know what to say to him, and sighs, her heart twisting up in her chest. He’s a completely different man than the one she fell in love with, but still so overwhelmingly the same, and she doesn’t know how to talk to him while maintaining the delicate working friendship they’ve established since his return.

She studies him instead. His mouth is swollen as if he’s been biting his lip constantly, and even his powers can’t prevent the bags under his eyes as if he’s lost sleep. His whole body is trembling, and she can hear how his pulse has slowed as a result of the alcohol. His bloodshot eyes, though-

“You’ve been crying,” Kara stammers, backing two steps away from him. His eyes darken, and he turns away from her. “Mon-El, _what happened?”_

“Brainy and Imra knew something I didn’t know about the past.” His voice is higher than usual, and he stares at a beer-themed clock on the wall keeping Martian time. “I thought I knew what was going on, but I didn’t.”

“Is it something you can tell me, is it my past too, or…” His shoulders visibly tighten, and she lets her mouth drop slightly. “It’s in my future, isn’t it?”

His silence is answer enough. “Shango,” he calls over to the short, dark-haired humanoid behind the bar, “can I get another ale?”

“No,” Kara interjects. “You may have lost this battle, Mon-El, but you are not losing that war. Not while I’m with you.”

His eyes bounce back to hers again, and he laughs, a particular chuckle that Kara’s never heard before and immediately knows is fake. “While you’re with me. Is that now, or seven years ago, or when I go back to the future and you’ve been gone for hundreds of years? Because I’ve got to tell you, Kara,” He stops while blinking his eyes slowly, still heavily inebriated- “I’ve gotta tell you, I don’t know how long I can do this. On one side, we have everyone I ever met here, who I’ve been treating like dead for years because I was never going to see them again. Then, by some mystery of the universe, I end up back here again. Suddenly those ghosts I’ve been pretending not to have on my shoulders for most of a decade are walking and talking in front of me, and everyone _else_ that matters to me won’t be born for centuries. And somehow I’m just supposed to _deal with it.”_ His voice breaks near the end, and her heart with it.

She ponders her next words carefully. “You know, whatever happens to me, or to any of us- we chose this life, Mon-El. We know that it’s dangerous, we know the risks. If we don’t get to live forever, it’s okay. I know that a mission could go wrong for me. I’m okay with it.”

He jumps off of the stool, stumbling as he stands up. “Well I’m _not_ , Kara. You’re going to live to be 150 or however long Kryptonians can possibly last on Earth. You’re going to live next door to Alex and her family and you’ll all raise superhero children to save the world with you, and then grandchildren and greatgrandchildren because _that’s how it’s supposed to be,”_ he enunciates as he takes a step towards her.

Kara backs away again, because he’s leaning over her now, so close that she doesn’t know if she’s imagining the feel of his soft beard against her forehead or not. He still smells the same way he did when she first opened his pod when he was so much younger; like fire and earth and the stars, and he’s looking at her with desperation that she knows deep down goes so much further than just to her.

“Shango,” she says finally, turning back to the bar, can you call us a cab?” Shango nods, giving her a curious look. She ignores it, placing a hand on Mon-El’s upper back to guide him out of the bar. Outside, the night air is unseasonably warm, and the dew resting on surfaces all around them makes the world seem pure. He’s still stumbling, though his movements have become slightly less erratic. When Kara leans up against the outside wall of the building and slides down it, sitting on the concrete, he repeats her actions.

They’re silent for a minute, both staring through the fence opposite them at the world beyond. There are car horns off in the distance, and what sounds like a firetruck ten miles away that is beginning to race towards their side of town. They hear the snores of elderly National City residents, the rustle of sheets where children are climbing into bed with their parents after a nightmare. Kara can hear Winn’s heartbeat among the twisting and turning sheets- he can’t stop worrying about Alex after how shaken up she was from her run-in with Purity. All around them, life is beating on.

“I have to die, Mon-El,” Kara says softly. “We all do. We all have a timeline, even if some are less linear than others.”

Mon-El shakes his head, more intentionally now. “I just- I just lived in the future, for years…and I never wanted to look, never wanted to know….and then Imra told me we’d have to go through time for our mission, and she just _lied_ to me. I worked so hard to keep my promise to you, Kara. I’ve tried so hard to protect Earth and its people, and my team, the Legion…I don’t know if I can keep _losing_ people, Kara, I lost Garth because I wasn’t careful enough and the idea of losing you, you’re- you’re the root of everything I am.” He reaches inside his shirt, pulling out their necklace and clenching the pendant into his fist.

Kara bites her lip, her mind searching for a response, before the truth hits her like a punch to the gut. “This isn’t just about losing people, is it? You’re hurt because Imra lied to you. She’s your wife, the one you should be able to count on more than anyone else in the world, and she hurt you.”

He sighs, looking away from the street and adjusting his torso to face Kara. “Kara, Imra and I, our marriage is not exactly the fairytale of legends, we…”

“Do you still have feelings for me?” Kara interrupts. As soon as she poses the question, she regrets it. His eyes widen, but he doesn’t move, and eventually he nods, resigning himself to the truth. Kara exhales, trying not to let the words affect her, but she knows that he can tell that her heartbeat is thrown off from it. “You still have feelings for Imra, too.”

This time it’s not a question. “Of course I do.”

 “Do you still love her?”

He’s frozen then, and his eyes turn glassy. He stares at her almost as if in disbelief, and Kara suddenly has the urge to shrink away. When he speaks, it’s so soft that even Kara strains to hear it, but she knows him, and she knows it's the truth. “Of course I do.”

Kara leans her head back against the wall then, her head racing at the conflict in the man beside her. They’re both quiet for a while. “I’m sorry,” she says, cautiously placing a hand on his own resting on the pavement. “You never asked for any of this. If I hadn’t pushed you so hard when you got here…”

“Don’t ever, ever apologize for that,” he replies, grabbing her hand and squeezing it. “Having you here when I was a stupid kid fresh off Daxam was the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Ever. And I’ve never forgotten that, even for a day.” 

He pauses, his eyes searching hers.“You know, there’s one more question you should probably ask.”

She knows the question, knows it deep somewhere inside her soul, and even though she probably knows the answer already she can’t bring herself to ask it, can barely think it. Because if she knows the truth and he vocalizes it to her, it will change everything they’ve worked so hard to protect. It will absolutely shatter this fragile island on which they’ve marooned their thoughts and feelings towards one another, and she doesn’t think either of them would survive it. “Does it matter?” She offers up ultimately. It feels like a lie.

He’s still looking at her. His eyes have finally returned to their normal blue, and she knows he’s okay again. He takes a few, steady breaths before responding. “I guess not.”

And the island gets bigger.

 


End file.
